So wrong

This is supposedly an English training video for Japanese ladies of the night...

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/3366/

Oh so speechless.

Wait

While waiting for my last class of the day to start I have won 2 games of Catan against the computer, the exchange rates have started to go back to normal, I called the publishers to arrange a sales meeting, fiddled around with facebook, and I taught some students who were early for class some msn abbreviations. Altogether a productive hour.

An excuse to put a picture of House on my blog

I started a new class today, it's an adult class with 13 students aged from early 20s to about 60. They all seem lovely, and not just because they are in love with my accent. All of them want me to train them how to speak with a British accent. It's funny because I'm actually losing my accent and am frequently speaking more and more in an American accent. Sorry Emily it's true. It's not even conscious anymore. The reasons for this disgrace are threefold. Firstly when I arrived in Korea oh so many years ago I was specifically asked to teach American English and an American accent. A request which I actually ignored in the beginning but which leads on to the second reason: When I spoke to Koreans in my "beautiful" British accent (My student's words, don't shoot the messenger) they couldn't understand me. Actually when I spoke to Americans and Canadians they couldn't understand me either SO, I would have to repeat myself:

Me: "Could I have some water?" (read in posh British)

American: (blank stare)

Me: "Water" (read in Texan drawl 'cos that's my favourite American accent)

American: Oh! Water!!!

Me: Yes that's what I said.

So to save time I lengthened my vowels and didn't pronounce my 't's, instead I would pronounce the 'r'at the end of words which I would normally not need to bother myself with. This leads on perfectly to point 3. Because so many Americans and Canadians work here and because the majority of Koreans speak English with an American accent, my accent has become assimilated... I wonder if this has happened to Hugh Laurie too... I realised this today and want to reclaim it! I want to apologise for neglecting you accent. I will endeavour to treat you better.

Watch out Korea, the Amazon starts small but look where that ends up. First it's 13 students, before you know it I'll have the whole of Korea speaking English properly.

How to Motivate

I don't know why this just sprung to mind but I'm reading now about effective teaching methods and acquisition so maybe that's it, anyway, last summer I taught a six week long winter camp for university students. The students came every day from 9-1 and studied with three different teachers. It was a long and very intensive course but the students were extremely motivated. I was teaching them by getting them to create group projects, for example a news broadcast. It was high energy and a lot of work but they threw themselves into it and seemed to be learning a fair amount into the bargain. Well by the 5th week they were beginning to show signs of exhaustion. I decided to take a day out to do something a little different and light hearted: Swear words!

Their level was quite high, some were nearly fluent and everyone needs to at least know how to effectively use and understand such a salient part of our linguistic repertoire. What I'm saying is that there were genuine pedagogical motives behind the lesson, believe me or not.

I have never seen such a genuinely interested group of students. I have never before nor since seen so many students in one class take notes and ask so many questions. One thing that made them laugh was the fact that my face would turn a bright shade of crimson every time I said a swear word or had to explain the literal meaning to them, which totally led them to ask me more questions.

The best part of the lesson was teaching the flexibility of the "F" word. I handed out a list more than a page long of different situations in which the fascinating word can be used. We talked about the different emotions it conjures up. I showed a video which you no doubt have seen, or if you haven't here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUaWCcDlI5s

The class was only one hour in duration but I have never seen a group of students acquire a new grammatical or lexical item quite so fast. As the time was drawing to a close one of the students raised his hand:

Me: Yes?

Jin: Can we fucking go now?

Me ...

Jun: Yeah, I'm bloody hungry

Cain: Absofuckinglutely

Me: Don't you dare bloody swear in your other teachers' classes.

Jun: No fucking way.

I've never been so proud.

EDIT: as an aside, the two students on the left are not aware that their hand gesture is considered extremely insulting to many native English speakers, well they are now but they keep forgetting.